Claus
by Fosco21
Summary: In a strange new world, Rosalina takes up the role of Santa Claus to bring joy to all the children.
1. Mama, be Santa!

_(I thought it would be interesting to write a Christmas-themed Smash Bros fic, and Rosalina seemed like the perfect Santa candidate. Some other ideas came to mind that I felt necessary to explore, and before I knew it, I had a nice looking short story mapped out. Sadly, I can't possibly include everything by Christmas Day, but I will aim to complete the story by New Year's. I hope you enjoy it.)_

* * *

Aboard the blue comet that streaked the night sky, Rosalina looked down at the world below. It was an especially beautiful planet, with blue oceans, white clouds, and above all, fertile forests all around. Only one thing was truly missing: the light of civilization. Indeed, the surface of the planet was quite dark at night with the exception of one single city, although it could hardly be called a city or even a town:It had less than a hundred people in it. Some of the people here chose not to live in that city directly, but the fact was, in terms of intelligent life, this planet was mostly barren.

It reminded her of how few Lumas were still with her today. Aboard her old Comet Observatory, over a hundred Lumas roamed freely and happily, but now, only her old friend Polari and the young boy named Lumi had made it here. She was not alone in that experience. Many beings drawn from various worlds had, like her, found themselves summoned to this one, but most of those who had many friends and loved ones found themselves sadly separated from them, along with their homes. Even her Comet Observatory had not come with her. This current Observatory was merely an identical replica she'd created after finding herself, Polari, and Lumi in this strange world.

Now it was just the three of them, limited by the nature of this world, and the strange limitations that even the two mysterious gods controlling it possessed. They could not bring anyone they wished here, and sadly, that had led to many unwanted partings.

At least, that was how it had been for her at first. Fortunately, the three of them were not the only people to come from her world to this one, and she was not the only human from her world, either. Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Daisy had all appeared here, along with Yoshi. She'd not only reunited with those friends but also found a wide variety of interesting people here from different worlds. In the past few months, it had been a real joy so far to befriend many people here, even if they'd been assembled for a far greater purpose than mere socializing. For now, though, that purpose was not relevant. It was time to relax.

She left the privacy of her personal tiny planetoid after she was done observing the world below and flew back to the main Observatory. On her way to the dome where her bedroom was, she found a yellow skinned and black-eyed Luma waiting outside. She stopped floating and let her feet gently touch the ground.

"Lumi? Are you having trouble getting to sleep?"She had already told him a bedtime story, but it seemed he was restless.

The star-shaped being glowed with a slight blue aura for a second. It was his equivalent to shaking his head, since Lumas couldn't do that.

"No, Mama. I wanna ask something. Did anyone ever tell you about Christmas?"

"Yes, they did."

Lumi floated upwards a little higher so he was at the level of her chest in height and Rosalina didn't have to look down at him as much.

"Well...You heard of the tradition with Santa Claus, right? Uh, I had this idea..."If he had thumbs, he'd be twiddling them right now in nervousness, as he glowed green for a moment, showing his slight fear and awkwardness.

"Yes, I have heard of it, and I would be glad to hear your idea."

Lumi started to get a little excited."Ok. Christmas is coming up. I was happy I'd get a present from Santa, but then that big meanie Pittoo went and told me Santa's not real... I was kind of sad about that until now, when I got this wonderful idea! What if you could make him real? Mama, could you please be Santa for all the children and give us presents?!"

"I would be very glad to, that is a wonderful idea!"

Lumi glowed really brightly with gold light in excitement.

"Yay! I'll go tell Kirby!"

He flew off towards the dome where Kirby was sleeping, but stopped when he heard Rosalina's voice.

"Wait, hold on!...Thank you. I can not let any of the children know who Santa is, Kirby included. Please let it just be our little secret. Also, thank you for telling me about what Pittoo said. I might even have to put him on the naughty list."

Lumi was relieved but a little worried."Please think more about putting him on it, I don't think he's really a bad guy at heart..."

"Okay. Then I will be sure to check it twice."Rosalina said while smiling.

Lumi was feeling tired, and he didn't know what else to say. He was glad his weird idea had been accepted.

"Thank you for being Santa for me. Good night, Mama!"

"Good night, Lumi."

After that, he floated away to go sleep, and Rosalina thought about her new task.

She loved the idea of being Santa. There weren't many children in this world, but all of them but Lumi had been separated from their parents, if they weren't already separated by unfortunate life events. It would feel good bringing joy to their lives, and she still had about two weeks to pick out the right presents.

With her goal in mind, Rosalina retired to her room and spent some time writing about her plans. Some of these presents would probably be very good, but she needed to make sure to make things the children individually wanted from the bottom of their hearts, not merely what appealed to a wide variety. As she was reflecting on their personalities and goals, she realized three minutes remained to midnight, and closed her notes. Two hours had passed in the blink of an eye, and now was about time for her routine nightly conversation with Polari. Eager to share her new plans, she flew to the top of the Observatory's spire and floated there. They went here to enjoy their view of the planet, and so they were far enough away that the children wouldn't be disturbed from their dreams.

Right on time as always, Polari, a black skinned and blue-eyed Luma, showed up for their chat, ready to give wise advice to her as he always did. Rosalina began with the routine pleasantries, smiling all the while.

"How are you doing, Polari?"

"A hundred and five and still kicking! How are you, Rosalina? You sound quite cheerful tonight."

"Lumi introduced a splendid idea to me today. He asked me to be Santa for all the children in this world."

"Oh? That's interesting. You'd make a fine Santa, but you definitely need some practice to give the right impression. What if they see you when they're not supposed to? You need lines prepared. Something like this. Ahem..."

Polari took in a big breath(not that Lumas truly needed to breathe) and prepared his best Santa impression.

" 'Ohohohoho! And a very merry Christmas to you too, young boy!' "

Rosalina giggled. "I am sorry, but I cannot see myself going _quite_ that far. You will have to help me be stealthy."

"Haha...can do.

So, do you have any presents lined up yet?"

"Actually, yes. For, Pit, I am thinking of making a ...

And for Ness, ..."

Polari squinted his eyes while glowing with a silver aura, one he had whenever he was thinking. "Hmmm...Your gift for Ness is good. That's definitely something he'd like. As for Pit's, I can't quite put my finger on it yet, but I think you may be misunderstanding him in some way. You should probably ask Palutena to be sure you have the right idea. She can definitely keep a secret, and she'd know Pit better than anyone."

That certainly seemed like a good idea to her.

"Thank you. Well, that is enough about me for now, I will think more about presents for all the children tomorrow What about you? Is there any problem you are concerned with?"

"Not really."

"Then I am glad to hear everything is good on your end."

"Okay.

...Is the kid doing okay?"

"I think so. He may seem depressed, but I think he's doing his best. I probably would've broken down completely if i had to endure everything he did at the same age. He's been through too much...At least he will dream well."

"Yep. He sure will."

Thanks to a certain someone, everyone in this world dreamed well.

They had few more ideas to talk about, so they just took this moment to enjoy their view of the stars. It was a new universe far from home, but even this world had much in common with their own. From her viewpoint in space, she could perfectly see the band of stars dominating the skyline. When stars weren't evenly distributed in all directions, and a band seemed to cross the center of the sky which looked much denser and brighter than the rest, that meant you were in a spiral galaxy. Even though she lacked the childlike wonder she'd once had when viewing such a sight, when she'd known nothing about what stars truly were or how they even were able to shine, her deeper understanding of how it all worked still never changed some things. Like always, it was beautiful to look at, and that was enough.

"It was nice speaking with you, Polari."

"Good night, Rosalina."

"Good night to you too, Polari."

With her goodbye done, Rosalina floated on down to her bedroom and allowed her internal thought process to wind down as she simply focused on her activities. She made the necessary preparations for sleep, eventually changing her clothes before she finally went to bed. The moment she rested her head on her pillow and began wishing to sleep, a great sense of ease came over her consciousness as she knew who was helping her try to have sweet dreams.

Her physical eyes closed, and she visualized herself in a new body entirely disconnected from the sensations of her sleeping one. She found herself between two worlds. Above her, there was a starry night sky as far as she could see, and below her, there was an endless field of water which perfectly reflected the sky. It was beautiful. It was as if heaven and earth had become one. In this newly visualized body, she floated above the water, and it rippled around her in all directions. As soon as she allowed herself to drop into the water, her carefree dreams would begin. For a little while, though, she looked up towards the stars again, and a new thought that came to her mind.

_Ah...I really am beyond the stars now, aren't I, Mother? Right where you said you would be...Well, almost. Don't worry, though, I know you're out there somewhere. I really love living here. ... I hope you're happy, too."_

She looked down once more towards the rippling water, and floated down far enough that her feet could touch it. Now, rather than reflect the stars, it formed a rippling image of a new land, and she knew she'd be there the moment she allowed herself to enter the image. She leaned forwards while levitating, and a moment later, the water now seemed like an endless wall in front of her. There wasn't any gravity, so up and down didn't really exist, and she wasn't pulled , Rosalina felt an inner desire to go to this new place. The image was still hazy, but she saw many things. A sparkling river surrounded by a green land and blue skies. It seemed like a happy world.

She closed her eyes, flew into the rippling image, and left waking consciousness behind, soon drifting off to peaceful dreams.


	2. Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve had come. Rosalina had everything ready, from the presents to the delivery plan to her plans for tomorrow.

In the mirror, she saw herself in a fluffy red and white Santa suit, complete with the hat. It looked a little silly, but it was good. Even if, in all likelihood, nobody was going to spot her, she still had to look the part. If all that mattered was the end result of present delivery, she could have simply asked Master Hand to do it and told him which presents she wanted him to create. Knowing him, he'd merely materialize the presents at the right locations with a snap of his fingers. Of course, that would have ruined the entire point.

She closed her eyes and focused. When she opened them, she was sitting at the edge of the Observatory's entrance bridge with her legs hanging over the ledge into space. Polari hovered about twenty feet away over the empty space in front of her.

"Today's the day, huh? Time really does fly. Are you ready?"

"Almost."One by one, mostly transparent blue orbs of light floated out of the dome on her personal mini planetoid before slowly floating down towards the two of them. Eventually, Rosalina positioned them in front of her near where Polari floated in empty space. Within those orbs, several differently shaped boxes rested safely, containing all of the different presents she had prepared.

"All set."From her seated position, Rosalina pushed off the ledge with her hands to scoot forwards and up. She slowly and easily floated forwards and upwards a few feet, all while straightening herself into an upright floating position.

"Ready to do the honors?"

Polari smirked."Yeah."

His body shined really brightly and emitted a controlled hum of power as he prepared his power, soon surrounding himself and all of the presents with a large whirlwind of blue light particles.

"A thousand miles stand between us and our destination, but worry not. I'll fly us down there with ease! Behold my glorious transformation!"

In a big burst of light, he exploded outwards and formed the whirlwind into something new. Rosalina laughed softly at him imitating how overly dramatic the Hungry Lumas were about transforming. Even after all this time, he still knew how to be a little childish and have fun.

She opened her eyes when the blinding light subsided a bit. in front of her was a spherical white spaceship of relatively simple design. The only exception to the simple white color was the large circuit-like line winding around the circumference of the sphere's middle from left to right, which pulsed with the steady dark blue light of Polari's soul.

_"I like it. Maybe you should give it a name?"_

Polari thought carefully before enthusiastically announcing the name.

_"Hmm, in that case I'll call it...the Christmas Comet!"_

Rosalina smiled._"That sounds wonderful!"_

_"Thanks."_

If all went well, unlike a normal comet, this ship would technically never be seen as one, but he was still proud of coming up with the fancy name on the spot.

Rosalina closed her eyes and visualized the interior of the ship. The area Rosalina sat in, which was in the upper half of the spherical ship, was like a dome and had a solid floor.

The interior of the other side of the sphere was not meant for humans. Instead, it was filled with cables that all came out of a concentrated blue sphere of light. This was the power source of the ship, as it was the point where Polari's consciousness was most concentrated.

When she opened her eyes, Rosalina sat in a chair at the center of her half of the ship, and the chair could swivel around to look in any direction. The walls, ceiling, and even floor were all made of material able to project holograms. She could holographically display anything that she wished to see, or even make the walls appear transparent.

_"Our first destination will be Bowser's Castle."_

They'd already set up their plans for how they'd deliver the presents to all the children long in advance, but Rosalina had left the order of deliveries a secret to Polari until the last moment.

_"Oh? Very bold of you, but I like it. Let us go where no Santa has gone before!"_

As Polari spoke telepathically, the ship was surrounded by a whirlwind of deep blue light spiraling out of its central circuit. After a few more moments, he had rendered it completely invisible to the normal light spectrum. The moment it was ready, the comet flew down to the world below to bring Christmas joy to all.


	3. Naughty

At his new castle, Bowser sat on his throne. He felt hollow. He had a grand castle, but he and Junior were the only ones in it. He was used to having servants, but he now had none, and beyond that, there were few meaningful things to do. Even this castle itself had merely been created by the seemingly omnipotent powers of the Master Hand, and could be destroyed just as easily by the other. He lacked the sense of control and power that gave him stability, but there was basically nothing he could do about it.

Tomorrow was that 'Christmas' holiday some of the human otherworlders celebrated, and Bowser was suspicious. He knew the manic and almost diabolical nature of one of this world's two gods, the 'Crazy Hand'. As both he and his brother claimed to have no name, many people here had come to name them based on their traits. They were both Hands, because that was how they always appeared. One was called Crazy because he was utterly unpredictable and acted that other one was called the Master Hand because he had higher authority than his brother, and did not act crazy in the same way. Instead, he was rather predictable in all things, always obeying the meticulous rule set he created.

For the last few weeks, he'd long suspected that Junior would receive a 'present from Santa', but it'd be from the Crazy Hand. It would definitely be some kind of trick if it was from him, something designed to humiliate him. Bowser had thought of a lot of things it might be. It wasn't going to be something intended to actually permanently hurt or kill him, as that just wasn't how things worked here, so it was definitely going to be made to make him look bad in some way to the other kids. Whatever it was, he wasn't going to let it happen. He'd open the present himself rather than let Junior do it, and if it sprayed something meant to stain Junior and make him look silly, he'd burn it up instantaneously before it could hit anyone. He'd probably be sad that he didn't get to open the present himself, but Bowser knew this was the best way. It was settled.

* * *

Junior had woken up today, on December 24th, at 5AM to his alarm. All this modern technology was pretty new to him. He walked over to turn on the light, and in a flash, the whole room was illuminated. Back at home, there had been perpetual lighting just as good as this, although it wasn't precisely the same. You could find magic crystals that made light, and in a special place like the castle, it could stay always on. However, most Koopas couldn't use magic like he and his dad and their Magikoopa servants could, and the crystals were rare too, so it was a luxury that only they and a few others had. But from what he'd heard, in some of these other worlds, everyone had lighting like this.

It made him feel upset, as he wanted to have special stuff nobody else could to show how much better he was than them. The magic hand had allowed his Papa to put all sorts of modern stuff in this castle, like the televisions, the video game systems, the home theater, and many other things, but he didn't like the idea that the hand was so much more powerful than them. Instead of being concerned over its danger, he was more worried that it had the power to make everyone equally 'special' if it really wanted. Sure, his dad had gotten the magic hand to give him all this stuff, but Bowser Jr still didn't like some stuff. Technically, the crazy hand could always take it away at any time, and if he wanted to, he could make all the other people get the same stuff. With a snap of his fingers, just like that. It made Bowser Jr green with envy...Although he was already literally part green.

He wanted to be special and better than the others, to have stuff they couldn't and show off how cool he was. Then they'd have no choice but to respect him and his dad, even though many of the adults and even some of the kids thought they were evil. And that was why he had woken up so early today, to ensure he could show he was the coolest to all the other kids.

For the whole last week, he had been practicing over and over again how to wake up without alerting his dad. He had a secret plan for what he was gonna do if there really was a present tomorrow.

He knew that it wouldn't be through the chimney, as the castle obviously had none. This was a vast castle with countless rooms and towers, so he doubted it would be something as simple as the highest tower, or any of the towers where you could drop something from above. Santa surely wouldn't make it a long chore of walking around just to reach or even find a present. He'd put it somewhere obvious. Since Santa couldn't get inside, the most common sense place would be outside the front door. The problem was opening said front door would trigger the alarm his dad had told him about. Therefore, he had to go out the castle's secret underground entrance and take a roundabout path, since his dad had told him that the secret entrance didn't have an alarm on it. He had practiced wandering the corridors enough this week and wasn't going to get lost anymore.

The reason he wanted to wake up before his Papa did was because he was afraid of something. He knew his dad would be paranoid and suspect any present was a prank, but that wasn't the real problem. If it really was a prank, he'd be glad to have it destroyed. However, what if it was the present he really really wanted? Normally that'd be good. But the present he really really hoped he'd get was something he doubted his dad would immediately let him play with. He'd make him do some kind of hard work first to 'earn' it and all that. He knew how it was going to be. Jr sighed. His dad would probably always be like that.

For a while, though, he hadn't believed Santa existed at all, and didn't bother with thinking of any crazy plans. However, he changed his mind one day nearly two weeks ago when someone told him that Santa was real. He still remembered what Pit had said then:

_"Actually, Santa's real!"  
"Really? I dunno about that..."_He'd remembered what his dad so repeatedly told him about not believing in stupid things.  
_"And how do you know he's real? Have any proof?"  
"Ummm...Well, I'll tell you if you promise to keep it a secret."  
"Ok, I promise not to tell anybody, but tell me all the details."  
"Lady Palutena told me. If you want to know exactly what she said, it was...uhh...Right. She said that 'there really is a Santa in this world'. So you believe me now, right?"  
_That was a shock.  
_"Seriously? She said she believes in Santa?...Wow. Now I really believe you."_

Palutena was apparently some kind of goddess, and her magic powers were almost as scary as Rosalina's, if not even scarier in some ways. Normally, Bowser Jr wouldn't trust a stranger, but from what Pit had told him about her, she wouldn't let herself get caught lying for a trivial reason. Dark Pit said it was about all gods having really big egos or something like that, and that seemed like it sorta made sense to him. He didn't realize that he'd forgotten to thank Pit for what he told him back then and just kept thinking about what his big plan was for tomorrow.

_Ok, i gotta do it just as practiced. With the magic paintbrush i'll just make myself invisible so i don't get seen by the lasers and stuff once I go out of my room. ___First I sneak out the secret entrance, get to the door. _Open the present, look inside. If it's a prank, i don't care. If it's real and he'd definitely let me have it, i just gotta go put it in that present box i have stashed and ribbon it up for a few minutes. Then get rid of the old box and replace it, sneak back in, go to sleep, and open it when the right time comes._

_If it's what i REALLY want, he won't let me have it right away. I need to...Take it out, go hide it away in the secret spot and get rid of the box. Put some lame present into one of the spare boxes i got and close that box up so it looks new._

He didn't know how to do the handwork needed to properly wrap a present and make the deception perfect. He'd just never bothered learning it, nor had anyone taught him, as normally there were servants who did this kind of thing for him, and his Papa was so often busy working or signing some kind of important official document. The only way he knew was the easy way, creating an illusory wrapping with the magic ink used by his Magic Paintbrush.

Bowser Jr felt was probably working too hard on this but this was nothing compared to some of the super duper serious fighting and war stuff he'd done before. It was no biggie. Even if he messed up, it wouldn't be the end of the world.

* * *

Christmas Eve:8PM

He'd gotten through the secret entrance in record time today, and his skills at making fake present box illusions were perfect. He was totally set. It was around time for when he was supposed to go sleep now, so Jr went to sleep. _Bwahahaha, Dad'll never know the difference!  
_

* * *

Christmas Day:12:30AM

The Christmas Comet floated above the clouds invisibly, and Bowser's Castle loomed on the horizon. Rosalina's destination was the living room, even though she was certain no Christmas tree waited there. She wouldn't be a true Santa if she let herself be stopped by a mere lack of chimneys, or did something as simple as leave the present at the door.

Rosalina turned to the presents, pointed her hand at the first red box, and made it float into the air. She levitated it towards her, grabbed it, and moved to hold it under her right arm at her side Afterwards, she made all the other presents float and collected them together into a larger orb of light that would make everything inside it float automatically. She made a slight squeezing hand gesture with her left hand's index finger and thumb, and the sphere of light became opaque, ensuring the presents would stay inside and remain unaffected by their environment. Finally, the sphere turned invisible altogether along with the presents inside it.

"Alright, I'm ready."

In response, the spherical walls of the ship morphed, leaving an opening where the billowing freezing winds flooded in. Rosalina flew out, but her Santa outfit pulled through and guarded her against the cold.

"Now's your time to shine."

"Gladly!"

The ship vanished in another whirl of dark blue light before finally morphing into a tiny black colored cap. In the place on its front where Mario's cap had its 'M', this cap instead had the white image of a Boo covering his face with his ghostly stub-arms, closing his eyes, and turning transparent. Rosalina took off her Santa hat and let the tiny one fly onto her head, before putting the Santa hat back on over top of it. She took as deep of a breath as she could. The instant she finished inhaling, a field of light covered her body and rendered her invisible, making her vanish from sight along with the box held securely between her arms.

[Rosalina got the Vanish Cap!]

However, she was far more than invisible:As she was now, she could phase through walls and avoid sound based, laser based, and even touch based sensors.

Bowser's Castle looked traditional from above, but she knew he had plenty of modern conveniences installed. Bowser Jr had bragged about all the things his dad's fancy castle had to the other kids, like big television sets, a home theater, a jacuzzi, and all sorts of things. She hadn't exactly spied on him other than the time when she determined where the living room was a few days ago. She knew more than enough already through her personal connections. Knowing his personality, Bowser definitely had some kind of modern security system installed. The only saving grace was that none of his Magikoopas were present in this new world, so this trick could still work.

Lastly, right now, Rosalina could not even breathe. She'd have to hold her breath the whole time if she wanted to remain properly phased. Polari, of course, could have done this all by himself because he had no need of oxygen, but she wouldn't be much of a Santa if she didn't deliver the presents in person.

_"Let's go."_Rosalina thought to Polari with a smile, relying solely on their mental link now that neither of them could properly speak.

Letting gravity take over, Rosalina allowed herself to fall quickly towards the castle. She fell for 20 long seconds. Since she was actually not limited by terminal velocity, with no air to push against her and slow her fall, she only continued to fall more quickly over time. She was going to be near the great hall soon. Once she reached a certain height, she flipped around midfall and used levitation to slow her fall for several seconds before she reached an acceptable speed. This was a very necessary step if she didn't want to accidentally phase a hundred or more meters through the ground and waste more time.

Soon, she slowed to the proper speed, let herself slip through the ceiling quietly, and stopped at the moment she knew she was on the right floor.

Even though the room was currently dark and unlit, while she also couldn't see it either way, she remembered exactly how the great hall was a very large room dominated by a long table which, of course, had a massive throne at the head where Bowser sat, even though he and Junior would normally be the only people in the room. On the left and right walls, many paintings of previous Koopa Kings hung, occasionally interrupted by unlit magic crystals that lit the room when it was used. Finally, above the red double doors that were a distance behind Bowser's throne hung a giant painting of his face.

_"Alright, we're in."_

Rosalina stepped down the red carpet which led out towards the table and throne behind her, going in the opposite direction red double doors studded with an imposing pattern of spikes.

Now there was only one final step, as she was now next to the door. Rosalina let go of the present at the exactly correct height. It did not land on the ground, but instead floated a few feet above it while remaining invisible and out of phase with the normal world. They'd performed a little magical trick on it. It would remain out of phase from the normal world and continue to float until dawn. To be absolutely sure it worked as planned, Polari also set it to de-phase the moment something physical collided with it. That way, if the levitation spell had a slight flaw and slowly drifted downwards or upwards even a tiny amount over time, it would not simply phase through the floor or slowly float up into the sky. Either of those outcomes would lead to the present being lost forever, and he'd had trouble casting this properly while still making Rosalina stay phased.

For a normal person, holding breath for this long would be difficult, but Rosalina had learned many things in her hundreds of years of life, so she was still well within her lung capacity. After letting go of the present, Rosalina flew up through the building and into the sky, letting the castle quickly fall into the distance below her as the cloud line approached ever closer.

After forty seconds of continuous flight, she was 2 kilometers in the air, past the cloud line and well out of range of any sensor system he might have. She finally let out her breath inhaled deeply as Polari reformed his normal body and let her de-phase.

After some heavy breathing, she recovered enough to speak with satisfaction, almost immediately recovered from exhaustion."...We've done it. Mission accomplished!"

Polari was happy and unfatigued._"Don't be too sure yet! We've still got a lot of places to go. Want to go to Skyworld next?"_

"...That can wait for now."

_"You sure? Who says she didn't just go to bed on time like a good goddess?"_

"We'll see."

In reality, it was probably a fifty fifty. Palutena was just like that sometimes. Staying up all night and using her 'Celestial Super Scanner' continuously, just to force 'Santa' to be stealthy and work hard? It seemed like something she'd get a kick out of doing. Rosalina smiled. Deep down, she liked the adventure.

"Let's go to Smashville next."

_"Okay."_

Polari proceeded to morph into the Christmas Comet once more around her and the presents, having the tact to not force her to phase another time or even go through a door. Now that it was no longer necessary, the cloaking sphere around the presents vanished, and they automatically floated into their standard positions as if pulled by magnets.

She sat in the central chair, ready to head out. With just a thought, she signaled Polari to head out, and the ship flew off towards its next destination.

* * *

On Christmas morning, Bowser Jr's secret scheme did not go according to plan.

After a 10 minute long adventure through the winding passageways of the 'secret entrance', which fortunately didn't have its booby traps or guards anymore, he had gotten to the front door by the roundabout way, only to see nothing there. But where else could it be?

After a minute of thought, Bowser Jr almost facepalmed as he finally came to the obvious realization. This world had people with all sorts of powers, ranging from teleportation to invisibility to literally creating matter out of energy and mental intent. If Santa could locate and travel to this world on purpose, he had to be super duper powerful. How else did he deliver presents to billions of people in one night? Of course he was not limited by physical obstacles. He had probably just created the present at the exact position he wanted it to be in. Jr felt so foolish now, but now everything became clear. If Santa could not put the present under the tree like the tradition told him to, he'd just do the next best thing. Logically speaking, he'd put it wherever the family gathered the most often:The great hall.

Bowser Jr sighed as he realized he was set to do a lot of backtracking. Oh well.

Meanwhile, Bowser had been awakened the moment Jr left out of the secret entrance. Three minutes ago, to be exact, by the quiet alarm. The cameras had shown Jr loitering around outside invisibly for some reason. He was tired. Whatever Jr was up to, he didn't want to think about it right now.

The secret entrance had formerly just been a gauntlet full of winding passageways leading into traps designed to kill anyone who tried to sneak into the 'weak spot' that was his castle's 'secret escape route'. Normally, what was supposed to happen was that vigilant Magikoopas would secretly watch this entrance all the time and use their magic to remotely trigger traps which would seal any intruders inside the moment they had all moved far enough in so that their whole group would be trapped and wiped out. It'd seemed perfect, but in reality, it'd just been an over-elaborate and unnecessary precaution, one which had never actually come to be of any use to him.

On the other hand, this new version of the castle lacked all the death traps. All that was left was the lava moat surrounding the castle, but nobody was realistically going to fall off the bridge into the lava when there were safety railings. Speaking of which, normally there was not a constantly existing bridge over the moat, and one was a bridge of light was conjured by Magikoopas when a large amount of people absolutely had to cross at once and they couldn't simply be flown over small group by small group. Of course, he and Bowser Jr did not rely on their minions utterly in their home world simply to get in and out of the castle. He personally could jump across the gap. Meanwhile, Bowser Jr could too if he used his magically powered flying vehicle, which he had disappointingly chosen to repaint to make look clown-like by giving it a face and eyes. A phase Bowser hoped his son would grow out of and had put up with thanks to how surprisingly useful he had been so far with magic to be able to use the Magic Paintbrush at such a young age.

He was getting distracted in thought. The moat had a bridge now per Master Hand's demands for safety, and Bowser kept the lava moat around solely as a reminder of his own world. It was the same reason he had worked hard to get this entire castle created rather than simply giving himself and Junior some kind of more modern mansion that would use much less space. Even if he wasn't going to let himself have inferior living standards to others, he wasn't going to give up his connection to his past either. They had been here for six months already, but eventually, he was sure they would get back.

Whatever Jr was doing, he had at least refrained from opening the main gate and remembered that it always triggered the blaring loud red alert alarm if opened past curfew. Maybe he was finally getting some manners and learning to consider those around him. That was good. Bowser yawned and decided to just go back to sleep, ignorant of a certain fact that would've disturbed him otherwise.

* * *

Thirty minutes later, Bowser Jr had searched the great hall. Looked at the highest tower just in case. Checked a few other rooms. If he tried to get into the treasure vault, he'd wake his dad up immediately, and there was no way Santa would put it in there. He'd searched this place a second time just now and his dad was bound to wake up in about thirty minutes. He was just about ready to give up, but he had one last thought.

Maybe, just maybe, Santa had hidden his present somewhere in his room where he wouldn't see it while getting ready for the day.

With that thought in mind, Bowser Jr decided to leave the great hall again, this time going to the entrance closest to his own room. As he shuffled along he suddenly stopped and stumbled backwards as he kicked something."Wha-?"

No way. A red box had literally just appeared in front of his foot. It was true, Santa really did watch children all day and night! Absolutely creepy. Bowser Jr wrongly assumed that Santa must've somehow put that box right in front of him the moment he gave up. Well, it didn't matter now. Bowser Jr took the box away to his room, where he had an additional few empty present boxes prepared. Apparently, he'd only gotten one present, or at least whatever could fit in this box. But it was fine. Bowser Jr tore open the box's cover, and once he got the cover off, he was ecstatic at what was underneath. The box itself had an unmistakable squid symbol on it. He excitedly yet carefully opened the box and saw what was inside.

For a few seconds, he just stood there in shock, he couldn't believe it! It was really exactly what he wanted! Then, like Link often did, he felt an uncontrollable urge to grab the item and lift it above his head as if presenting it to the world._"YesyesyesyesYES!"_

[Bowser Jr got the Splat Paintbrush!]

A paintbrush, but not one just designed for making portals, manipulating light, shapeshifting with ink, and in general performing all sorts of nasty tricks for combat, like the Magic Paintbrush Bowser had made his best Magikoopas build for him. He liked that one, for sure, but it didn't satisfy all his desires in having fun. It made goop, but that goop could only be of one type, and it was only cleared away by water, and his Papa refused to let him ask the big Hand to change it. That meant whenever he wanted to play with the Inklings in their Splat Battles, he had to use one of the standard Inkling weapons, and that didn't make him feel very unique. This one, on the other hand, was solely designed to splat stuff! He'd be able to have it change the color and type of ink it used depending on which side of a Splat Battle he was on just like normal squid weapons, which meant it would definitely work. It was magic, so he could already tell that just from holding it, there wasn't machinery or anything that you had to read an instruction manual to learn how to operate, he could literally feel the information flowing into his mind somehow, which meant it must've been made by the stupid overpowered hand. But still, this was exactly what he wanted!

Bowser Jr was really excited and eager to test it out, but he obviously could not do so inside, and instead proceeded with his plan to secret the paintbrush away and put a substitute boring present within a new box. He'd convinced Blue to spend some of the credits he'd earned in the tournament on a few lame toys and give them to him in exchange for double the credits. His Dad tracked all of his personal purchases, so he would find out his plan easily if he purchased random toys with his own credits and then had those same toys be 'delivered by Santa'.

Honestly he felt a little bad about it...But he wanted to play with that brush today! If he didn't have it, he wouldn't be able to show off his present to the other kids! Maybe they'd even think Santa had given him coal and laugh at him. He wouldn't snitch them out to his dad, of course, and he'd get back at them eventually with a good prank or two if they ever made fun of him, but it still hurt to think about it, that they might laugh at him behind his back and he'd never know. Some of the adults hated Bowser, and it was no wonder why, especially those ones that really thought he was pure evil. Jr, on the other hand, was 'just a kid' to many of them, even though he felt that was an insult that unfairly disrespected him merely due to age. He really wasn't stupid. He'd pulled off a really cool trick on the Mario Bros once and it'd all been super important and stuff. Even so, they all still just thought of him as his father's pawn, and it really upset him.

He forgot about his upset attitude when he realized how great the present was. Who cared what those adults thought? He had other people he wanted to impress with his present. It'd be fine. Jr finished setting up the plan by putting the new paintbrush into the new box and making an ink illusion that made said box look unopened, carefully placed the box a few feet away from the living room door, put his magic paintbrush back where it was supposed to be in his room, and went back to sleep.

* * *

"Juniooor! Come down here this instant!"

Papa was angry. A bad sign.

"Okay okay I'm coming!"

Bowser had opened the present at a point in time when he thought his son would not be disturbed by a loud noise, and was surprised to find that there was nothing harmful in it. Indeed, just a few mediocre presents. The fact that 'Santa' had somehow bypassed the security system did not surprise him. It was probably the work of one or both of the Hands, whose powers had shown no hard limits thus far. Then, after he put the box's top back on, he noticed that the ribbons had turned into some goopy ink, and the explanation was obvious.

Junior opened the door and saw his father standing there facing him, right next to the present now streaked by multiple lines of ink where ribbons had once been._Uh oh..._

"Where's the real present!?"

"It...uh...I hid it in one of the closets."

"What is it?"

"A paintbrush. It's like those Inkling weapons, and it'd let me finally have a unique weapon when I play with them..."

"Why did you hide it from me?"

"...I was worried you weren't gonna let me play with it until i'd earned it, and that I'd be the only kid who couldn't celebrate with their present today. As if i didn't even get one."

Bowser sighed."You should have known better. You must have spent all that time plotting, and all you did was stain the floor."

Bowser Jr tensed himself in fear, not wanting to hear how he'd be grounded.

"Of course, I can just have the carpet recreated in an instant. For today, you can keep the paintbrush."

He couldn't stand the thought that the other kids might look down on Junior because he didn't have his present on the day of celebration.

Jr would've shouted "Yahoo!" and jumped for joy, but he could feel the 'But' coming, and he was only able to lift his gaze to make eye contact.

"But after today, I'm taking your clown car. If you want to fight anymore, it'll have to be with the paintbrush alone, until you learn to fight without relying on weapons. You know you woke me up in the middle of the night, right?"

Jr wasn't sure how to feel, he always relied on his Clown Car. It felt counterintuitive that the thing he had stolen was not taken away, but it was probably because he'd made a good plan to get it, and Bowser wanted to foster that kind of scheming mindset. He'd probably let him get it back sooner if he promised to repaint it so it didn't have the clown face, but he was proud of that design, he wanted to keep it looking that way, as stupid as his dad thought it was.

"...Huh? But how? I was invisible the whole time, from the moment i left my room."

"I got more security than just the lasers, you know, and I purposefully didn't tell you that i put motion sensors on the secret entrance too. I was wondering if you would ever try to wander around with the magic paintbrush and sneak out for some reason, so I didn't tell you about the sound and temperature based sensors either."

"...Oh."He felt dumb.

Bowser's mindset changed from a somewhat calm tirade to extreme anger the moment he came to a horrifying realization. How could he have let this thought slip by him?!

"You realize that if I hadn't been thorough and put all the data on you into the system, not just your face, that the computer wouldn't have recognized you, right? The cameras would have seen you as an intruder and activated red alert! The whole house would be on lockdown, blaring alarms, locked doors, everything! I would've been worried sick that you might be somehow at risk or kidnapped until I finally got to the computer and checked the sensor logs, and even then i wouldn't have known for sure if it was you or someone else! Did you even know what you were doing!? I could've thought you were hurt or worse!"

Jr was scared and almost wanted to hide in his shell, but instead just cowered and cried."I'm so sorry! I didn't know, really! I won't do it again! I...I just didn't know I didn't wanna scare you I didn't wanna do anything I'm sorry I just thought it was just this little thing!"

Bowser tried to calm his anger with deep breaths."...You're lucky it still seemed that way to the computer. We both are.

...It should go without saying, but I'm taking the magic paintbrush too."

"...O-Okay..."

He could see Junior was still crying and that he was so afraid he couldn't even look at him, his voice was still shaky. He forced himself to do something very difficult:admit that even a little bit, he was not fully in the right.

"...But you were right. It's alright. It was just a little thing. It'll be fine."

Junior was crying again, but his breaths got steadier after hearing that. He had been hoping to hear 'I forgive you', or 'I'm sorry', or for his dad to hug him, but  
he knew he was just stubborn like that. He didn't like to concede what he'd demanded and not feel like he was in control... But that was ok.

"...Thanks, Papa."

His dad wasn't usually like this. Usually he'd get angry and never even begin to apologize. But it wasn't just his dad who was different. Normally, he would've cried or whined a lot more, and just a few years ago, he definitely would've thrown a fit, but he'd changed a lot in a short time. Even that normally wouldn't have stopped him from crying more and trying to make it all go his way, but he wasn't sure what he was feeling right now. Normally he just got angry whenever he cried, but this was different. He really felt sorry, he felt like he'd really hurt his dad by scaring him like that. Most of the time when he made someone feel bad, he'd just laugh at them, but this was so different. His dad was normally this invincible figure who could never be hurt or be afraid, he always seemed like he controlled everything. Seeing him be scared for him because of a reason that was entirely his fault just felt so wrong on so many levels, not that he really got it at all or understood what he was feeling, and all he could really do was try to pick up his emotional pieces after totally breaking down in tears and not knowing what he felt.

After he wiped the tears out of his eyes, Bowser Jr started talking with more confidence.

"I'll make sure to win the Splat Battle against the Inklings today with that new paintbrush."

He was regaining confidence and remembered what he was supposed to do, this was a result he wanted.

"Good. I'll be rooting for you. You're free to go where you wish now. But first let me see the paintbrush first and know how it works."

Bowser Jr nodded. Somehow, he managed to smile, but it wasn't like this was the worst thing he'd ever experienced.

"Okay!" He ran off to go get it, pretending to be somewhat okay in the act of running. He still felt really bad about himself, but it was all so he wouldn't make Bowser feel too guilty about yelling at him. He decided to just stop thinking about it and quickly forgot his worries in the excitement of realizing his dad would probably ask him to demonstrate the paintbrush's abilities in some area outside where the paint wouldn't get on anything in the house.

* * *

Bowser only now began to think about this 'Santa' imposter. They really did understand what Jr wanted. Fortunately, it wasn't something too girly or weak like a normal paintbrush. It was a weapon that would actually work in real fights if it was used in the right way. This was a middle ground he could accept, and whoever was posing as 'Santa' had to have understood them both very well.

_Maybe it's Palutena. _She was more of the whimsical type compared to the straightforward do-gooders of his world, so it made sense that she would be a secret 'Santa'. Moreover, she seemed relatively indifferent and unconcerned in a certain way, even to Ganondorf himself. Bowser imagined that it was probably natural to her for a certain reason:She was apparently immortal, and all major threats who opposed her in her world were already slain. On top of that, her powers seemed nearly limitless in variety, so it wasn't so unreasonable that she'd somehow placed a present in his home without the computer knowing. To Bowser, it seemed somewhat probable at the least that she was the one behind all this.

Of course, Bowser never even came close to realizing who it really was. He would've scoffed at the very thought, yet it was true all the same. As Santa, Rosalina strictly followed the rules of the tradition. You could only judge the children as naughty or nice for what they had done in the year in question. As the year during which Bowser Jr had helped his father in his evil schemes had already gone past, she couldn't bring it up in her evaluation. As for what Bowser Jr had done this year, his bad side came out most obviously whenever he fought. His problems were benign whenever he happened to win, amounting to bragging at most. However, whenever a match came up where he lost, he was a really sore loser. It wasn't as bad of a problem as it could've been, since he tended to forget about his losses whenever he started winning again, bragging about his victory rather than holding a grudge against whoever had defeated him last. It also helped that the other kids who fought him were mostly good sports and didn't create a negative cycle. It seemed like he'd gotten more control over himself when it came to some of them. He was starting to be more friendly with Pit despite clearly being much less skilled at him in fighting, and he'd made a real effort over the past few months to get the Inklings to accept him joining their Splat Battles. Ultimately, they'd accepted him and others joining because 2 people simply wasn't nearly enough to replicate a proper Splat Battle in the first place, and they had to modify the sport overall as a result to accomodate the fact that all the other participants could not be Inklings, with the exception of Kirby, of course. In fact, the only reason they did Splat Battles here was because Bowser Jr come up with the idea of how to modify the sport to make it work for non Inkling participants. Not all of it, but it'd really worked out and made both the Inklings and several of the other kids happy. That, along with a few other things, was more than enough for her to put him on the nice list.

* * *

As Rosalina moved on to the next children, before Bowser Jr would receive his present, she reflected for just a little while on him. He may have been naughty at times, but nobody was truly perfect. His level of growth was surprisingly good, considering his cultural background and upbringing, and she was content with his progress so far. The culture for the kids seemed really good, and everyone was really moving along nicely even if there were rough edges here and there. As much as she held a serious grudge against Bowser, Bowser Jr was still just a child. He had time to grow. With that in mind, she comfortably moved on to thinking of the next children she'd deliver gifts to.


	4. Rockin'

_(Author's Note:Sorry for taking so long on this. __I'll try to keep to a more regular update schedule from now on. Also, everyone who reviewed so far, thanks, your feedback means a lot to me.)_

Christmas Eve:Smashville

Only a few minutes had passed since midnight, when she had begun her deliveries. The invisible Christmas Comet made its way across the world, and before long, Smashville was in clear view.

It was really just a small village, even if some of the buildings looked modern. All the houses were clustered towards the center of the town, and other buildings were towards the outside. There weren't any overly tall buildings, and in fact, their main headquarters wasn't in the village at all. Part of that was because of Master Hand's need to make things grandiose. It was no wonder he had put the headquarters of the organization on a floating island. However, there were other reasons. It would go against the sense of community if there was a giant building overshadowing all of their homes in the place they lived, and Master Hand had wanted to create a sense of equality. Overall, she agreed with the design choice.

Rosalina closed her eyes and focused her mind on one of the houses below. It was one of the very few fully decked out with Christmas lights.

A moment later, she reappeared inside the living room of Rock, or as he sometimes called himself, Mega Man. It was what some people would consider a TV room, but because he was from a futuristic world, there was no physical TV whatsoever. It almost seemed as if the room was empty, aside from the various comfy couches in it.

Even though he lived alone, Rock's house, or rather, his dad's house, was essentially a mansion. Many people here wanted to keep their old homes, and many of them had their homes recreated. Rosalina looked over to the Christmas tree. He'd arranged all the ornaments and set up the lights all by himself, even though he would be the only one there to see it. It was some real dedication for someone celebrating a holiday tradition from another world. She carefully set down the present box next to the tree. Afterwards, she teleported to the room where he had put his stocking. He had no fireplace, and the stocking was hanging near the wall in a dining room. She placed the Merry Christmas letter inside. She had made one for every child, of course, but so far, Rock was the only one who had put in the effort to hang a stocking, so he was the only one she gave a letter.

Before she left, she decided there was just one more thing to do. Rosalina teleported to Rock's room, curious about whether or not he was sleeping well. As she looked, he was breathing steadily and evenly, and he seemed sound asleep. Then she turned around and was surprised by what she saw.

On his wall, in sight of him every time he woke up, there was a big picture of him, his father, his brother, his sisters, and his mother all smiling atop the Light Industries Headquarters with Rock in the center of the frame, sticking his tongue out and making a silly face. Right next to that picture, there was another set in an indoor laboratory room of some sort. Rock, and Blues were standing in the center of the frame, and all the other Robot Masters were smiling for the photo alongside them. They were just like a family. Suddenly, what she'd heard of his personality and how he acted all clicked and made sense.

_ He must be so homesick..._

...But it was alright. She didn't need to be sad for him. Some day, he would get to go home and see his whole family again. She was sure of it. Once that happened, all would be well. Even now, he would surely love this present tomorrow. With that thought in mind, Rosalina vanished from Rock's room and reappeared inside the Christmas Comet once more. Polari quickly chimed in with some commentary.

_"Huh. Well that sure is surprising. I really figured that of all the kids, he'd definitely be the one who'd try to catch you more than anyone else."_

It wouldn't be like Rock to secretly record all his home's rooms with cameras while pretending to be asleep, he'd think of that as boring. So she wasn't worried about that at all. When she'd sensed him completely asleep, she'd been pretty surprised too.

"Maybe he was simply more curious about what his present was than who was delivering it."

Polari laughed telepathically. As weird as that was.

_"Sounds about right. Well, i'm sure he'll be happy about it. Your presents are normally pretty good already, but you really bat that one outta the park."_

Rosalina laughed lightly."Speaking of which, I'll give Ness his present next."

_"Sounds good to me!"_

This time, she wouldn't need to go anywhere else to reach her next delivery. Rosalina focused on another home below and readied herself to make another child happy as Polari waited where he was in the air.

* * *

Two hours later, Rock felt himself gradually grow conscious by virtue of his internal alarm. As he blinked his eyes open, he realized that it was two in the morning, but that was fine. He got up and looked at the family photo on the wall. It was a good reminder, but...

Nobody was here. Not Dad, not Roll, not Rush, not one of his family or old friends. Just him, all alone.

Thinking about Santa Claus made him feel homesick. From what he remembered of what Santa looked like, he was a fictional character who looked almost exactly like his father. The big white beard, the jolly smile, pretty much everything...Well, excepting the gut, of course. Rock really wished he could go back home and see him again, but it was alright. He'd just remember him in his own way, by trying to follow his example. That was why he was waking up right now, after all.

He was already in his normal clothes, but since it was rather cold outside, he put on a dark blue jacket. Even he could get cold as long as he kept his body at its normal energy output, and he didn't want to power up every time he casually walked around. If he really wanted to, he could easily get used to it, but he didn't like the idea.

Rock strolled through his room and walked over to one of the doors, which led to a mostly empty and small room. Almost the same size as the bathroom, but what was there was very different. He flicked the light switch on, and the main thing facing him on the opposite side of the room was a giant green pipe which extended out of the wall. It was so large that he could simply walk straight into it without crouching at all. At the end, however, there seemed to be nothing but a sudden stop as the green pipe ended in a blank black wall. A Warp Pipe. This was the kind of stuff he was used to now.

He flicked another switch to the right of the pipe, and the sight of the wall was replaced by the sight of more pipe, ending in a white walled room with no windows. At the end, there was a single brown door with a gold five pointed star symbol on it. At the point where the wall of his room had just been, he could see the luminous purple edges of the portal circling around the pipe.

Rock walked through the pipe and made his way to the room where the door was. Its lights had automatically turned on when the portal activated, so he could easily see what he was doing. There were no windows. He opened the door and closed it behind him, letting it lock.

Now, the familiar sight of the Warp Zone lay before him. It was less like a warp zone, and more like a castle. In fact, the interior layout looked exactly like Peach's Castle. The room he had left out of was just one of many, each of them had a portal room of their own. Or at least, everyone who wanted one had gotten one. Most of those rooms had doors connected to the first floor of this castle, which only connected to the homes of people. On the second floor, one could reach any of the battle venues they fought in. On the third floor, you could reach almost any physical location in the world. The third floor was easily the most extensive, and as a result of the sheer number of locations it connected to, it didn't connect to them directly. Each door led to a portal room that led to a hub location where you could access more locations. And then another. The planet was basically divided into sectors, and each of the main portal rooms on the third floor led to the center of one, while all the portal rooms they connected to brought one closer and closer to one's intended destination.

And, lost in thought as he was, he soon found he was at the top of the second set of stairs. He didn't take time to admire the paintings, and simply walked along towards the door he was looking for. A little while later and he'd finally made it to the Floating Stadium's entrance pipe. Or at least, the one closest to the place he wanted to get to. Finally, he left and found himself walking out of a green pipe on the side of a small green grassy hill. It was one of many hills in this area approaching the cliffs, so as to not make it stand out like a sore thumb. The pipe definitely did, but since it was in the side of the hill, and the angle above it was steep enough, you couldn't see it from the towers near the stadium, so it didn't ruin the view for anyone who looked closely.

Once he got out of the pipe, he took a round silver disk off his back, one the size of Link's Hylian Shield. With no need for a button based interface, Rock sent a jolt of electricity from his hand into the disk, which soon glowed with energy. Then he let go of it, and it slowly floated to the ground, before floating a small distance above it and fluctuating slightly in its height up and down. Yes, it was a hoverboard. Due to its size, it didn't really look big enough to easily stand on without anyone who did that falling off as it moved, but that was the trick.

Rock made a little hop, and before he even landed on it, the disk projected a big holographic disk of light out from its edges, increasing its effective horizontal size by several times. Now it was about as big as a surfboard.

As for this island, the stadium itself was the main feature of the place, but there was still quite a great deal of land surrounding it. A variety of buildings were present nearby it to provide places to rest or eat food, and beyond that, there was a good deal of natural grassland that led all the way up to the cliff edges that hung at the edge of the island on all sides. The island floated above the ocean, but Smashville and solid land were still visible in the distance.

After just a minute or two of riding his hoverboard towards the cliff where he saw his friends, he was here at the agreed on time and place. Ness was sitting in the distance along with Pit. Their legs were dangling over the edge of the Floating Stadium's grassy cliff and the 1 kilometer drop straight into the sea below. Behind the two of them sat a present box. They were chattering away, unaware of him as they looked towards the village. Once he was practically right behind them, Rock hopped off his hoverboard and left it to sit on the ground.

"Hey guys!"

"Gah!"Pit suddenly lurched forwards and waved his arms in these weird circles as he tried not to accidentally lean forwards off the cliff, surprised by Rock's sudden revelation of his presence.

Pit got on his feet, turned towards Rock, and blurt out a complaint."You almost made me fall off! Try calling first!" His soundless hoverboard didn't exactly give many cues.

Rock deadpanned, feigning confusion."Huh? I told both you guys the exact second i'd show up: right now, 2:01, right on the dot."

"But that doesn't help me because..."Pit was ready to complain again then went red with embarassment.

"Because what? Can't you just che-"Rock reached an awkward realization, and his smile stopped. He'd intended for his surprise to be a joke, but now it wasn't funny. "...Oh. Sorry, Pit."

Ness stepped to Pit's defense to make him feel better."It's fine, Pit, we both lost track of time talking, and i should've kept track. Rock, not everyone has an internal chronometer. Just try calling next time, okay?"

Rock shifted with embarrassment as he tried not to look away and kept eye contact with difficulty."Ok. My bad, guys...Sorry."He felt like he'd really messed up the conversation already, but Rock joined them in sitting and watching the ocean to try not to make it any more awkward.

Pit reassured him with a smile. He was really glad he hadn't fallen off, though. Then their conversation would've been cut short.

"It's alright, I'm getting better at reading."He sat back down and turned to Ness." So, are you ready for the jump?"

"Yeah!"

"Alright, I'll go deliver it!"

Pit picked up the present box behind him, and then, through Lady Palutena's help, Pit's wings suddenly glowed with blue light and he leapt off the cliff to fly away towards the distant Smashville. Fortunately, thanks to Ness's telepathy, he could still be part of the conversation. Meanwhile, Rock couldn't help but be a little jealous. Even if Pit's flight was only possible with a goddess's help, it had to be amazing to fly around like that. Meanwhile, Ness furrowed his brow in thought."Hmm...I kind of want to talk a little more."

Rock seemed to pick up on what he meant. "Ok."it would be kind of awkward to meet up and then just do this without talking at all, even if it was pretty late for Ness, who he had to remember could get tired. The Power of Flight still had plenty of time left."About what?"

He felt like he had a handle on what Rock liked talking about."Tell me more about your dad again."

Rock was happy again."Oh, he's awesome. Even though he has to do so much work, he always makes time for us, and he's always happy in spite of everything. It really rubs off and makes me just enjoy life more. Whether it's me, or the world, he always just seems to have so much to give."

Ness squinted a bit in thought. Needed to make this joke come out right...There it was.

"So...Dr Light's basically Santa?"

Both Pit and Rock laughed, Rock for the longest, while Ness deadpanned as if it was a completely normal statement."Hahahaha!...haaa...Yeah. You're right. He really is." They were used to the telepathy by now, which basically let them hear anything Pit said, even him laughing, although they still couldn't see him since he was far away.

"Yeah. Seems like he's basically your world's version of Dr Andonuts. Although I guess even he didn't invent as much crazy stuff as your dad did. I mean, inventing robot bodies we could transfer into to fight Giygas was super cool, but literally creating a race of human robots? That's astronomical levels of awesome!"

Rock suddenly switched to a face of shock and shame, and facepalmed, before his shame changed to curiosity and excitement."Ah!How could i never have thought of it! Stupid me! Three months now since you told me and i never once asked what it was like for you when you and your friends got transferred into robot bodies! What was it like? Did you have biometal blood like me? Could you breathe? Did your processing speed increase by a multiple or exponentially? Did your ESP still work?"

So many questions...But that was a Rock thing to do."...Yeah. Our robot bodies felt more like puppets that moved after we moved. It's hard to explain to a non psychic. Jeff actually didn't get to go, because the robot bodies only worked for psychics."

"...That's too bad. So do you mean that you felt as if your 'real' body overlapped with a mechanical one? Could you stop feeling pain whenever you wanted, and move your 'psychic' body in a way that didn't have to perfectly match your mechanical one?"

"...Uhhhh, yeah, basically, if you explain it that way. I could only really separate my arms a little bit from the robot body, though, the rest just wiggled apart a tiny bit sometimes. And we couldn't just stop feeling pain, Giygas's attacks were all psychic."

Rock paused, thought for a moment, then continued."...Okay. What did it feel like when you used your ESP? Where did you get the energy from?"

Rock had questioned him a month ago about where he got the energy from when he used ESP in his normal body and it really seemed like he was trying to make a Unified Theory of ESP or something.

"...Uh, i dunno, to be honest. We all took a rest in the Super Revitalizing Chamber before we switched bodies, so we were way stronger than we'd ever been. We couldn't breathe or anything while we were robots, not like you do. So basically...Our power came from our pure fighting spirit and hotblooded determination!"

"Really? Cool!"He actually believed in that kind of power.

Ness nodded."Yup, that's how it works. If you wanna know what Jeff'd say...He'd probably say that was only possible because the robot bodies were made of the right stuff to hold our PSI powers, but yeah. We didn't really have a power source, and we all got more and more tired the more we fought Giygas. He was really a nightmare. There wasn't even anything for us to aim at, he was totally formless and he was all around us! Soon enough, we were almost all out of juice, and we would've been doomed. But then Paula prayed to everyone in the world to save us, Giygas's mind collapsed from the power of love, and we won!"

He'd heard Ness's story a million times, and it was still beyond Rock how the ESP mechanism allowed all the prayers from mostly non psychic people to bypass space-time limits into some other-dimensional lair to defeat a formless mass of what was basically hatred and anger incarnate, but it was alright.

"Okay. You guys were really big heroes. Honestly, I wish i could do something as cool as that."

Pit was confused and blurted out a question through their telepathic link._"Huh? But you're a hero too! Didn't you save the day and stop Dr Weil's evil plan?"_

Rock suddenly paused and averted his eyes. "...Yeah. I just don't want everything that happened to be what defines my life."  
He should've been proud of doing the right thing even if he couldn't save everyone, but he couldn't help but be sad. He really didn't want fighting to be all he was ever known for, either.

"No matter how many times Dad says I did all the right things i needed to, I always feel that it's my fault. That I should've known better. I'd really rather not talk about it."

"...Okay."Ness wasn't sure what to say next, and decided less was better than accidentally offending him by trying to comfort him in some way that might accidentally lead to a touchy topic.

Rock was silently thinking for a few seconds. He'd learned all he wanted to learn about Ness's adventure for now. It was still really exciting to think he might be able to understand it one day. Ness was the one who got the conversation going again.

"Don't worry about what's already happened. I'm sure we'll all be ready to fight any bad guys who come here, and you will too! We're all in it together. Plus we're all learning a lot of new stuff now that there are so many cool people here to teach us!"

Rock smiled and got up from his spot sitting on the cliff, now standing next to the edge."...Yeah. It's been really fun." He remembered that it had been around two minutes, and in the distance, through his superhuman visual abilities, he could see the faint blue particle that was Pit flying around in the air. It'd been two minutes already, and the Power of Flight only lasted 5 minutes at most.

Ness realized and sent a private telepathic message to Pit. A few seconds later he started talking again. "Alright. Pit knows we're ready now. Let's do this!"

Ness got up and ran off a long distance away from the cliff while Rock moved a good distance to the right so that he would not be in his way. Soon, Ness was about 100 meters away from the cliff. Of course, this was Ness's first try at doing something like this, but that was just how Ness was. He didn't want the first time he did this trick to be for something boring like testing it out without doing anything.

Ness got into a sprinting stance, his right hand on the ground as he leaned forwards. He called out to Rock."Ready?"

"Yeah!"Rock waited in anticipation as Ness started to spark with an aura of blue jolts of PSI. Meanwhile, he got out his phone, pointed the camera at Ness, and began recording video.

"Here we go!"

Finally, Ness sprinted off forwards at incredible speed, and the sparks of lightning grew more and more intense the more he ran as he also got faster and faster. In just another second, Ness would pass him, so Rock turned to the side as Ness leapt off the cliff at superspeed. A few seconds later after Ness gathered a lot of speed from gravity, with his enhanced hearing, he heard Ness shout something as he got ever closer to terminal velocity. He readied his fingers on his phone camera.

" Super Diving DIMENSION BUSTEEEEER!"

_Snap!_With perfect timing, Rock captured the exact instant Ness finished his over-dramatic declaration and blew through a sparking portal of PSI energy. Rock even got a glimpse of what was past the portal. Within a second, the portal faded, and Rock stopped the recording. To be honest, hearing that line made him cringe a little, but he was still very happy it had all worked out.

He'd done everything he'd wanted to today. Ness and Pit had surely handled the delivery well, and now he could go sleep. Rock got on his hoverboard again and casually made his way over to the Warp Zone entrance he'd gone to earlier, and soon enough, he was right back inside his room. It sure was nice how quickly they could let you get around.

When he got back, Rock noticed once again the present box next to the tree, but he didn't need to know what was in it yet. Rock went to sleep and wondered what it might be in peace.

* * *

The next morning, Rock woke up rested. And when he got to his present and opened it, he found that it was...

An electric guitar! So Santa really had a sense of humor, and had enough common sense to find out about his past. He loved rock and roll! After getting into a proper daytime outfit, Rock immediately picked up the guitar and started playing it. He couldn't wait to see what presents his other friends had gotten.

It seemed like whoever had decided to be Santa probably really understood what they all wanted. Today was going to be great!

After he was satisfied playing the guitar a little, Rock put it down and picked up his phone. Rock laughed as he accessed the messenger app, selected "Dark Pit" on his friends list, sent him the video he had recorded, and added a text below:

_You owe me 1000 coins:)_

* * *

Ness appeared outside his house in a trail of sparks and skidded on his feet across the street next to his home. He came to a stop just a few meters away from the front door. He hoped that maybe someday he'd finally get good enough to stop himself right on the doorstep without accidentally overshooting and breaking the door. It didn't really matter, though. All that was important was that he hadn't messed up and gotten himself covered in soot.

As Ness made his way through his house, he saw that a present box really was there. That was pretty neat. He soon went to bed, happy that everything had gone well.

Christmas Day:Morning

Full of energy, Ness got right out of bed. His room wasn't anything too fancy, and his house was just a duplicate of his parents' house. He was pretty sure they'd all make it back home, though, and he wasn't lonely or anything. Instead, having this house here just gave him good memories. It wasn't like he really had any ideas for how to redesign the place, either.

Before he even ate any breakfast, Ness was going to get a look at that present. The small red present box didn't look like anything special, so he just quickly opened up the box. Inside of it was...

A baseball. Ness frowned. It was a nice gesture, but Ness's love of baseball just didn't work out in this world. Too many adults, not enough kids his age to play with. You needed a whole lot of people on each team for it to be playable at all, many more than even the Splat Battles were done with. Ness was glad to get one, but he was sad that it wouldn't really help much. Then he actually grabbed the baseball.

_Woah!_He'd felt some kind of psychic link to the baseball when he touched it, and instantly dropped it in shock, since he got zapped with some kind of weird purple lightning on contact, and was super surprised. A baseball, a spherical inanimate object, was somehow psychically linked to him? This was getting really weird, and for him, that was seriously saying something. Ness then cautiously touched the baseball again. The moment he focused on it with his PSI, he heard a weird voice.

_"You got the Magic Baseball! If you throw it or smack it away with your bat, or even if it gets destroyed, don't worry, you can bring it back! Just think of it and it'll be in your hands again!"_

It felt more like an automatic message than an actual person telling him these things, and as an esper, he could tell. But it still creeped him out. Wait. A magic baseball that could return when he hit it away? Hold on, there was something important there._...That means i can finally use baseballs when i fight! Yahoo!_

Technically speaking, his baseball bat was magic too, since the Master Hand let him conjure it. But it'd never really happened before that anyone got to conjure and throw something that wasn't designed to be a weapon. All this time, he'd thought the most he could do was use his bat or his yo-yo, but this was so much of an improvement. He couldn't wait to tell his friends about it!

* * *

Christmas Eve:Smashville

And that was another delivery down. She still had multiple to go in Smashville, but it was all going pretty well. There wasn't much to do but move on to the next, but she still felt a need to chat a little bit. "I hope he loves that one."

_"Oh, I'm sure he will! Especially when he's batting baseballs at you nonstop."_

For the next month, Ness was probably going to use that projectile just as much as Simon and Richter used theirs. But this was the price of being Santa. "Don't forget, if Lumi gets tired of them, you're up next."

_"How could you abuse an elderly man like that?"_ Polari suddenly gasped before frowning...Well, he would've done those things, but he didn't have a face... _"Just kidding. But I'm sure he'll get used to it eventually."_

"Let's hope so."He was still just a kid, so he'd probably spam the baseballs for a while before he got used to using them in a good proportion to everything else he used. But it was alright. She still really enjoyed this. That baseball had seemed like the most perfectly fitting present he could get. Even though it had no sentience and just psychically connected to its wielder, the Magic Baseball couldn't help but remind her of something. The similarity wasn't quite right, but it really felt perfectly right for Ness, too, to have a weapon he could connect with.

With little else to say, Rosalina moved on and focused on delivering presents to the other children who lived in Smashville.

* * *

Christmas Eve:Final Destination  


Amidst the black void of space, floating admist a vast cloud of dark purple lightning, a twitching hand fidgeted chaotically and randomly.

Miss Santa naively dreamed her deliveries would all proceed in a boring orderly fashion where it all went like she planned. She'd even asked his brother for help! What foolishness. One week ago, the nanosecond she'd requested Master Hand's help, he'd seen through what she wanted and instantly prepared his plans to mess it up.

Crazy Hand snapped his fingers, and in a present box far far away, a Magic Baseball was instantly enveloped by chaotic purple lightning, before it soon faded from sight and withdrew into the ball's center.

""OOOHAHAHAHAHA!"

Crazy Hand cackled madly. None of them would ever see it coming...The time for chaos was near!


End file.
